: This level is tougher than most of the ones we've been through so far, but on
: Kindergarten (which used to be my preferred difficulty), it's fairly
: simple to get through. It is made all the more easy by the fact that there
: is a secret area containing a second pistol. Now that we can dual-wield,
: it becomes pretty easy to take down the Fighters we encounter, and our AR
: can help us take out the Hulks.
Kindergarten certainly was my preferred difficulty, and still is for stuff like Marathon: Phoenix (the final level on there is a killer, even on Kindergarten). However, it is no longer. Yesterday, I began a playthrough of M1A1 on Normal. I stopped yesterday at the end of Never Burn Money, but now I'm already on the end of Neither High Nor Low (and no, I did not skip Colony Ship For Sale... like I did on my last Kindergarten playthrough). I am absolutely loving it.
Looking back, the sentence above is ridiculous. Sure, it's easy on Kindergarten, but it's definitely not a cakewalk on Normal. The Hulks may be slow, but they are ammo-sinks, which may be okay on Kindergarten, but on Normal, it means we have to waste tons of .44 Magnum or MA-75 Clips. Furthermore, they can quickly back you up into problematic situations, especially when there's a few of them. If we use Grenades and AR fire at the same time, the Hulks go down reasonably fast, but it's still a problem.
However, the Hulks are definitely not the main source of ammo problems in Marathon. That title goes to the Hunters, whose habit of sucking up two or even three Grenades can leave us dry of explosives for a long time. I first ran into this issue on Bob-B-Q, where the onslaught of Hunters sucked me dry in the middle of combat with a Major Hunter. Talk about nasty situations. I was left with almost no health, despite having (I think) a full 2x Health at the start of that particular battle. The second time was during Neither High Nor Low, where I once again ran out of Grenades. Luckily, it has more ammo on it than Bob-B-Q, so I was able to regain what I had lost.
I guess I can learn a lot about gaming in one night.
Vale,
Perseus
